AMID TALKS, FORD WORKERS WALK OUT AT 4 PLANTS

Hundreds of United Auto Workers walked off their jobs early Saturday at four Ford Motor Co. plants as negotiators struggled into the early-morning hours to avoid the first national strike at the automaker since Gerald Ford sat in the White House.

The talks over a contract covering 101,000 UAW members at Ford highlight a sea change in the industry: major carmakers are trying to save money by farming out partsmaking to independent companies.

Workers at assembly plants in St. Louis; St. Paul; Kansas City, Mo.; and Flat Rock, Mich., left their posts immediately after a midnight deadline passed, according to Nick Sharkey, a Ford spokesman. The Michigan facility is a Mazda plant, he said. The St. Louis and St. Paul plants were open Saturday.

As talks continued, it was not clear how widespread the walkouts were, but Sharkey said it was "probably hundreds" of employees.

In addition, he said, there were some plants, including one in Buffalo "where workers walked out and their UAW leadership told them to go back to work. So it has been mixed."

Despite the apparent wildcat walkouts, the UAW said it had not authorized a strike or set a new deadline for talks.

The UAW, which hasn't struck Ford nationwide since 1976, has threatened to strike this time over Ford chief executive Jacques Nasser's plan to spin off Visteon Automotive Systems and merge it with partsmaker Lear Corp.

Analysts have said such a move could lead to Ford selling plants to firms that are hostile to unions.

But a wider work stoppage was expected to affect tens of thousands of workers at companies that rely on Ford as a customer.

Although few experts have predicted an extended walkout, both the union and Ford have plenty of money to endure a long showdown. The UAW is flush with $753 million in its strike fund; Ford is sitting on $22 billion in cash.

Ford Motor Co. has 16 assembly plants and 34 manufacturing plants. Last year, the company had earnings of $6.6 billion on sales of $144 billion. Its U.S. market share through last month was 24 percent.

The UAW's announcement came about 2 a.m. Saturday, and union officials declined to comment further. Local union officials in Saline, Mich., and St. Louis had said there was a minute-by-minute contract extension.